Argos is the biggest non-food retailer in the United Kingdom. Their annual sales are $6.7 billion. They sell home improvement products, lawn and garden items, and other home and electrical appliances from their catalog, website and 700 stores around the United Kingdom and Ireland. During their rapid growth, Argos needed to improve the efficiency of…
Gains and loss reports for the first half of 2013 are in, and show mixed signals in terms of our overall economic situation. The economy grew at a sluggish 1.7 percent annual rate for the second quarter (April through June), according to the announcement by the Commerce Department on Wednesday. Though this was a better…
It took just a few weeks for U.S. and Canadian transportation authorities to issue new regulations on rail operators following the July incident reported here yesterday. On July 23, Transport Canada issued a new rule requiring at least two crew members to be on board any train carrying hazardous materials.
On July 6, Canada experienced the worst rail disaster since 1910. Seventy two freight cars parked safely in a parking area were improperly secured and left to roll into the downtown area of Lac-Megantic, Quebec, killing as many as 50 people and destroying 30 buildings. The train, which belonged to Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway…
E-waste, or electronic waste, is becoming quite a problem in developing nations. Not only are these countries producing mass amounts of their own e-waste, it has been common practice for developed countries to send their e-waste to developing nations for disposal, and the result isn’t pretty. Most of this waste comes from manufacturers and businesses…
Proctor & Gamble employs 130,000 workers in 80 countries, offering a variety of consumer products under an array of brand names. In 2005, this $55 billion company acquired Gillette, a Cincinnati, Ohio based company which provides razors, Oral-B dental health products, Braun shavers, Duracell batteries, and various small appliances. Gillette’s distribution center for products sold…
A new study by Stratfor Global Intelligence concludes that China is stepping down from its unofficial position as the go to cheap labor source of the world, and other developing countries are now emerging as a replacement option for global manufacturers in need of a cheap labor source. By the year 2015, China’s most expensive…
According to Avid Garman and Samuel Thernstrom in their op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal, Europe’s use of renewable energy resources such as wind and solar power by far exceeds the use of green energy in the U.S. America’s currently generates 3.5 percent of their energy from wind and solar sources while Denmark has,…
Overall, the economy was relatively flat during the first two quarters of 2013, with an estimated GDP growth of just 1.5 percent. Rail profits in all rose just .8 percent, yet Union Pacific managed to secure a strong growth of 10.4 percent, nearly beating their record profits in year over year gains. Overall load volumes…
Computer giant Apple is once again forced to examine its supply chain, particularly in China. Earlier this year, Apple introduced its Supplier Responsibility Program report, one of the most transparent reports on a company’s suppliers to date. Their own report revealed labor rights violations in addition to 150 instances of suppliers mishandling the hazardous waste…